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People who can afford their home will not like watching their property values and quality of life decline because a neighbor “rented” its back yard. Taking the

by blunte 7y ago

People who can afford their home will not like watching their property values and quality of life decline because a neighbor “rented” its back yard. Taking the Uber approach - ignoring laws - won’t work here, so this business is entirely at the mercy of permit laws. I find it astounding that some ideas get prominent backing. Furthermore, home owners will discover that having people travel alongside their homes to reach the rented studios will be unpleasant and unsafe. Will the tenant be allowed to come and go at any hour? Will the home owner know that the person creeping alongside their bedroom window at night is the tenant rather than a burglar? Will the tenant be allowed to park in the homeowner’s driveway, or will they line the front curbs of the house with their car and any visitors’ cars?

sburl 7y ago
Hi there - my name is Spencer and I'm one of the co-founders of Rent the Backyard. We're very much focused not taking the Uber approach. We're working within the context of a set of laws California has passed over the last several years that establish and regulate what the state calls "accessory dwelling units" aka ADU. We're initially focused on building in cities like San Jose that have factored the sustainable and conscious development of ADU into their thoughts on how to combat the housing crisis they face. 4300 ADU were permitted and built last year in California with hundreds of these units being built in the Bay Area (https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Are-accessory-dwelling-units-an-answer-to-Bay-13776416.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Are-accessory-dw...). We're really conscious of the impact we'll have on the neighborhoods we operate in and are committed to working with everyone involved to make the process of installation and ongoing housing have a minimal impact. Our studio apartments are almost completely built when they arrive in your backyard and require very minimal (a few weeks if not days) to bolt together and be ready to go. We're excited to see California have strong laws to protect neighbor's privacy and rights as well and will go beyond what is required by those laws when it's the right thing to do.
- blunte 7y ago
  Hi Spencer. I applaud you for trying to formalize and refine that ADU process (for the goal of helping people find affordable housing). The California market might be suitable for this, but that market is unique in many ways. I wonder how this can scale beyond CA (perhaps that market is big enough...). Given the alternatives to unaffordable housing, I see the appeal. But as other commenters have noted, this need exists because of a very warped localized economic situation. The real problem may not be solved, but eventually there will be some shake out (such as vast numbers of people deciding it's not worth living there) that will help to normalize things. When that day comes, your business model will be less relevant. Cheers and good luck.
sjg007 7y ago
Accessory dwelling units are the thing that most municipalities are into now in order to meet affordable housing mandates. I guess this is a way to finance the construction and try to be the next airBnB. I wonder how it will work legally? I get the financing angle... but you’d have to attach to the primary mortgage (or a second one) I assume. Once the unit is built what’s to prevent the homeowner from reneging on the deal? How would it work if the homeowner wants to sell? Is the deal similar to how a solar lease works? An ADU will cost $150k basically and financing it shouldn’t be difficult but I can see the appeal for and end to end. I assume the homeowner is effectively on the hook for the financing and some minimum 50% term reduces the capital cost.
closeparen 7y ago
Accessory Dwelling Units are nothing new: https://www.planning.org/knowledgebase/accessorydwellings/ https://www.planning.org/knowledgebase/accessorydwellings/
helen___keller 7y ago
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I must say it's very peculiar to me reading the reactions like this one. > People who can afford their home will not like watching their property values and quality of life decline because a neighbor “rented” its back yard. Why should neighbors get a say in your legal activities? >Furthermore, home owners will discover that having people travel alongside their homes to reach the rented studios will be unpleasant and unsafe. Unpleasant already seems like a stretch, depends on the tenant I suppose, but unsafe is really pushing it. Have you ever lived in an apartment or a multifamily home? It's really not that astounding that you could live in close proximity to another human without it impeding on your quality of life. You don't even share walls in the case of an ADU. >Will the tenant be allowed to come and go at any hour? I would certainly hope so, these are human beings not indentured servants >Will the home owner know that the person creeping alongside their bedroom window at night is the tenant rather than a burglar? I don't even know what to say. Isn't this the case for any existing neighbor? >Will the tenant be allowed to park in the homeowner’s driveway, or will they line the front curbs of the house with their car and any visitors’ cars? This is a fair concern. I imagine you would want this cleared up before signing to continue, probably depends on a case by case basis.
- blunte 7y ago
  > Why should neighbors get a say in your legal activities? This is one reason why there are different layers of rules on what a property owner can do - zoning laws, building codes, ordinances, community rules. Neighbors get a say because what you do on/with your property can significantly affect your neighbors. When one property owner does something that adversely affects a neighbor, that sometimes leads to conflicts which play out in courts or councils. If you want examples of how neighbor disputes result in new rules, just do some searching for "neighbor dispute". You'll find some amusing, scary, and even baffling cases. And with regards to living in close proximity to others, that is something that you know before you choose to live somewhere. It's not usually something that suddenly changes. You may have a quiet neighborhood with relative privacy. When your neighbor uses their back yard, it's perfectly reasonable. You know or quickly learn how many people live on each side of you, and you acclimate to the level of traffic/activity around you. And judging by your research and what you experienced during early viewings of the property, you decided whether you were comfortable with that level of activity. But now your neighbor(s) are adding ADUs, potentially doubling the number of people living around you (and correspondingly doubling the activity and traffic). > I would certainly hope so, these are human beings not indentured servants Do your neighbors normally walk between the houses to enter their own house via the back door? Probably not. Will the ADU renters be walking through their landlord's house to reach their ADU in the back? Probably not. And chances are, your house is fairly close to your neighbor's house. Prior to the ADU situation, you probably didn't have much foot traffic, particularly late at night, alongside your house (between yours and your neighbor's houses. But now you have one or more people walking between the houses, by your bedroom window, as often and at whatever time as they want. You might have made a difference decision regarding buying your house if you had known this would be the case. This is a bit similar to the hoopla when Waze first became popular. Occasionally a quiet neighborhood with small, low traffic roads would become a major thoroughfare because Waze routed people around large road traffic and through your neighborhood. Residents were quite disturbed. Now think about property crime. It's very easy to steal or vandalize property, but it isn't a problem in many areas because the people living in those areas become familiar with their neighbors and people's patterns of behavior. And when someone notices something peculiar, they may contact a neighbor (or the police) to ensure that everything is ok. Increase the population in the neighborhood (and especially add new traffic paths which specifically involve entering people's back yards), and you have greatly increased the difficulty of residents having a sense of what activity is normal and what is potentially criminal. Yes you can return to the apartment or high occupancy argument, but areas of high occupancy have already adapted or built in behaviors to help prevent crime. Usually it involves more walls, less windows, more locks, more isolation. These aren't reasons why people typically buy a home with a yard. I frankly don't care if people do this ADU thing or not. I'm just pointing out that it will be a change with significant impact that many people will not expect. This will change the character of neighborhoods from places where people settle and live to places landlords buy because of the rental opportunities. You'll have higher turnover of people in the neighborhood. It will essentially turn a traditional neighborhood into an apartment block with extra lawns. I promise you'll see groups with good financing buying up these homes to rent (and to rent the ADUs in the back) more than you'll see regular (non-landlord) people coming to enjoy the kind of life that apartments don't provide.

by blunte 7y ago

sburl 7y ago

Hi there - my name is Spencer and I'm one of the co-founders of Rent the Backyard. We're very much focused not taking the Uber approach. We're working within the context of a set of laws California has passed over the last several years that establish and regulate what the state calls "accessory dwelling units" aka ADU. We're initially focused on building in cities like San Jose that have factored the sustainable and conscious development of ADU into their thoughts on how to combat the housing crisis they face. 4300 ADU were permitted and built last year in California with hundreds of these units being built in the Bay Area (https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Are-accessory-dwelling-units-an-answer-to-Bay-13776416.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Are-accessory-dw...). We're really conscious of the impact we'll have on the neighborhoods we operate in and are committed to working with everyone involved to make the process of installation and ongoing housing have a minimal impact. Our studio apartments are almost completely built when they arrive in your backyard and require very minimal (a few weeks if not days) to bolt together and be ready to go. We're excited to see California have strong laws to protect neighbor's privacy and rights as well and will go beyond what is required by those laws when it's the right thing to do.

blunte 7y ago
Hi Spencer. I applaud you for trying to formalize and refine that ADU process (for the goal of helping people find affordable housing). The California market might be suitable for this, but that market is unique in many ways. I wonder how this can scale beyond CA (perhaps that market is big enough...). Given the alternatives to unaffordable housing, I see the appeal. But as other commenters have noted, this need exists because of a very warped localized economic situation. The real problem may not be solved, but eventually there will be some shake out (such as vast numbers of people deciding it's not worth living there) that will help to normalize things. When that day comes, your business model will be less relevant. Cheers and good luck.

sjg007 7y ago

Accessory dwelling units are the thing that most municipalities are into now in order to meet affordable housing mandates. I guess this is a way to finance the construction and try to be the next airBnB. I wonder how it will work legally? I get the financing angle... but you’d have to attach to the primary mortgage (or a second one) I assume. Once the unit is built what’s to prevent the homeowner from reneging on the deal? How would it work if the homeowner wants to sell? Is the deal similar to how a solar lease works? An ADU will cost $150k basically and financing it shouldn’t be difficult but I can see the appeal for and end to end. I assume the homeowner is effectively on the hook for the financing and some minimum 50% term reduces the capital cost.

closeparen 7y ago

Accessory Dwelling Units are nothing new: https://www.planning.org/knowledgebase/accessorydwellings/ https://www.planning.org/knowledgebase/accessorydwellings/

helen___keller 7y ago

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I must say it's very peculiar to me reading the reactions like this one. > People who can afford their home will not like watching their property values and quality of life decline because a neighbor “rented” its back yard. Why should neighbors get a say in your legal activities? >Furthermore, home owners will discover that having people travel alongside their homes to reach the rented studios will be unpleasant and unsafe. Unpleasant already seems like a stretch, depends on the tenant I suppose, but unsafe is really pushing it. Have you ever lived in an apartment or a multifamily home? It's really not that astounding that you could live in close proximity to another human without it impeding on your quality of life. You don't even share walls in the case of an ADU. >Will the tenant be allowed to come and go at any hour? I would certainly hope so, these are human beings not indentured servants >Will the home owner know that the person creeping alongside their bedroom window at night is the tenant rather than a burglar? I don't even know what to say. Isn't this the case for any existing neighbor? >Will the tenant be allowed to park in the homeowner’s driveway, or will they line the front curbs of the house with their car and any visitors’ cars? This is a fair concern. I imagine you would want this cleared up before signing to continue, probably depends on a case by case basis.

blunte 7y ago
> Why should neighbors get a say in your legal activities? This is one reason why there are different layers of rules on what a property owner can do - zoning laws, building codes, ordinances, community rules. Neighbors get a say because what you do on/with your property can significantly affect your neighbors. When one property owner does something that adversely affects a neighbor, that sometimes leads to conflicts which play out in courts or councils. If you want examples of how neighbor disputes result in new rules, just do some searching for "neighbor dispute". You'll find some amusing, scary, and even baffling cases. And with regards to living in close proximity to others, that is something that you know before you choose to live somewhere. It's not usually something that suddenly changes. You may have a quiet neighborhood with relative privacy. When your neighbor uses their back yard, it's perfectly reasonable. You know or quickly learn how many people live on each side of you, and you acclimate to the level of traffic/activity around you. And judging by your research and what you experienced during early viewings of the property, you decided whether you were comfortable with that level of activity. But now your neighbor(s) are adding ADUs, potentially doubling the number of people living around you (and correspondingly doubling the activity and traffic). > I would certainly hope so, these are human beings not indentured servants Do your neighbors normally walk between the houses to enter their own house via the back door? Probably not. Will the ADU renters be walking through their landlord's house to reach their ADU in the back? Probably not. And chances are, your house is fairly close to your neighbor's house. Prior to the ADU situation, you probably didn't have much foot traffic, particularly late at night, alongside your house (between yours and your neighbor's houses. But now you have one or more people walking between the houses, by your bedroom window, as often and at whatever time as they want. You might have made a difference decision regarding buying your house if you had known this would be the case. This is a bit similar to the hoopla when Waze first became popular. Occasionally a quiet neighborhood with small, low traffic roads would become a major thoroughfare because Waze routed people around large road traffic and through your neighborhood. Residents were quite disturbed. Now think about property crime. It's very easy to steal or vandalize property, but it isn't a problem in many areas because the people living in those areas become familiar with their neighbors and people's patterns of behavior. And when someone notices something peculiar, they may contact a neighbor (or the police) to ensure that everything is ok. Increase the population in the neighborhood (and especially add new traffic paths which specifically involve entering people's back yards), and you have greatly increased the difficulty of residents having a sense of what activity is normal and what is potentially criminal. Yes you can return to the apartment or high occupancy argument, but areas of high occupancy have already adapted or built in behaviors to help prevent crime. Usually it involves more walls, less windows, more locks, more isolation. These aren't reasons why people typically buy a home with a yard. I frankly don't care if people do this ADU thing or not. I'm just pointing out that it will be a change with significant impact that many people will not expect. This will change the character of neighborhoods from places where people settle and live to places landlords buy because of the rental opportunities. You'll have higher turnover of people in the neighborhood. It will essentially turn a traditional neighborhood into an apartment block with extra lawns. I promise you'll see groups with good financing buying up these homes to rent (and to rent the ADUs in the back) more than you'll see regular (non-landlord) people coming to enjoy the kind of life that apartments don't provide.